Condé-sur-Noireau

On 16^th August the 50^th Division were at Condé-sur-Noireau, north of Flers.

“Our Division was involved in actions at Anctoville (north of Villers-Bocage), Aunay, Pontécoulant, Condé-sur-Noireau and St Pierre (du Regard, south of Condé), where the Germans fought desperate rear guard action attempts to delay the advance.  In the meantime British troops advancing from the Caen area and Americans from the west, began to encircle the Germans …We led the Division from Conde to and beyond Falaise on the way to Vernon on the Seine.” (Extract from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

"The 61st Recce Regiment over-ran a German column including its Regimental Pay Office.  The Paymaster and his staff promptly started tearing up their bank notes, scattering them to the wind.  A couple of enterprising 61st Recce HQ lads managed to 'rescue' some French 1,000 franc pieces, then spent all night piecing them back together, using rubber solution and cellophane strips off biscuit tins."  (Extract from ‘From One Learn All’ by Dave Dennis, published September 2017)

Eric Brewer records that on the 15th August he was still in the "Same place - mortar time" on 15th August (ie "a forward position on the encirclement") and on 16th "Same place, mortar fix bombs.  56 Eggs (sic) moved out."  On 17th August he was“in base waiting for big push”  (From Eric Brewer’s Diary by kind permission of Derek Brewer and his family.)

 

17^th August 1944 – Americans take the citadel of Saint-Malo (a port on the north coast of Brittany) after heavy fighting and the Canadians capture Falaise in Operation Tractable.  Condé-sur-Noireau and Flers (west Of Falaise and Argentan respectively) are liberated by the 11th Armoured Division, now attached to XXX Corps.

Field Marshal von Kluge, Commander-in-Chief of the German Army West declines an order from OKW (Hiter's Army High Command) for a counter-attack and issues orders for a full-scale retreat from Normandy.  He is instantly replaced by Field-Marshall Walter Model and kills himself on his way back to Germany to face Hitler.  Model orders the Seventh Army and Panzer Group West to escape through the gap in the Falaise pocket held by II SS Panzer Corps on the north side (against the British and Canadians) and XLVII Panzer Corps to the south (against the Americans).  (From ‘Overlord’ by Max Hastings, Macmillan 2016 edition.)

The leaders of the Vichy regime flee east and set up a government–in-exile in Sigmaringen, south-west Germany.  Marshall Petain, the French World War 1 hero who became Chief of State in the Vichy government, refuses to leave Vichy and is arrested by the Germans on 20^th August.